Caught in a loop
by Chris-P-Nugget
Summary: In which Louise realises the meanig of the word "overkill".
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I disclaim everything contained below. Seriously.**

**Caught in a loop**

Louise stared through the smoke screen her latest explosive spell casting had wrought. She could see a shape in the dust cloud. It was humanoid, that much she could see. Her shoulders slumped in defeat.

It was probably just an unlucky student caught up in her blast. When the smoke cleared however, she found that it was in fact not an unlucky student. Instead, standing tall in the middle of the circle of scorched earth and grass was a brute of a man. The man was of average height, but appeared to be _very_ well muscled, if his bare torso was any indication. He was naked from the waist up, for whatever reason. The only things he wore above his baggy pants were a golden necklace with a blue gem in the middle, as well as two golden bracelets and two golden rings around his upper arms. His fairly long hair, long for a male anyway, was dark as coal and spiked in every which direction. His gaze was strangely blank as he stared at her, then slowly at everyone else around him.

Inevitably the jeering began. The man frowned. Louise heaved a resigned sigh. Professor Colbert reminded her that she had yet to complete the ritual. And then everything went down to hell in a single impossible clusterfuck.

The strange man that was supposed to be her familiar raised his arms to his waist, as if he was lifting something heavy and _screamed_. If possible, his muscles grew even more. His hair started changing color. Gales of incredibly strong wind started blowing outwards from his position. An aura of yellow-greenish light became visible around him, faint at first then growing in intensity with every passing second. By the time he was done, the power he emitted had actually created a crater beneath him. Louise faintly noted that he was not falling in it, but rather floated in the air. Great. She had summoned some sort of insane muscle-wizard. And then the man, whose hair was now a brilliant blond _smiled_. It was _not_ a nice smile.

He raised his hand, and the world turned green for a second. Then the green light traveled inwards and into his hand. It gathered there, turning from the dull green tint it had been before into a blindingly bright one. The man curled his fingers around it, and then pointed his closed fist towards the onlookers. Professor Colbert was in front of her in a second, his staff raised to protect. The man uncurled his fingers and the light traveled towards them. Then it expanded. The size of the… whatever it was easily dwarfed the entire castle, swallowing the court along with the students gathered in it in less than a second.

For a very short time Louise felt pain, and then she knew no more. Where once the Tristain academy of magic stood, was now only a single enormous crater.

* * *

><p>Louise opened her eyes. She was in her room. The sun had just started shining through her window. There was a bird perched just outside of the window, chirping merrily.<p>

Louise was not a morning person. But after a dream like that she didn't know if she would ever be able to sleep again. Slowly she stood up and started getting ready for the school day. Nightmare or not, the Valieres didn't skip school just because they'd rather crawl inside their closet and start telling themselves that no overly muscled, insane wizards were about to blow them up.

Later that day, when the time for the annual springtime familiar summoning came, Louise did not start boasting about summoning something incredible, like she did in her dream when Kirche goaded her. Instead, the chant she had spent months to complete changed. This time she chose to replace the "powerful" with loyal.

There was an explosion. Louise found herself silently wishing for her spell to have simply failed, like many times before.

Unfortunately, her wish did not come true. She once again recognized a humanoid shape in the dust cloud. In the back of her mind the pink haired mage noted that her knees started trembling.

When the smoke cleared, she once again beheld a brute of a man that she had summoned. This time however, the man was _huge_. She couldn't tell if he was as muscled as the one from her dream, as he wore some sort of blue mantle, or cloak. His attire somehow made Louise think of a uniform, though she had never before seen anything quite like it. The man was blond, also like the one from her dream. However instead of wild spikes a shiny bald head with a single strand of blond hair growing just above his forehead glistened in the sun. An equally blond mustache covered his upper lip from view.

The giant looked around, confusion clearly showing on his face. His blue eyes settled finally on Louise, who had frozen in shock. And who could blame her? Just like in her dream, in which she and all of the academy had perished in a giant green fireball caused by her human familiar, she had once again summoned a human. Just like in her dream, which she by the way still remembered as if it happened just a few hours ago, the man was blond. To top it all off, she had a sense of déjà vu the whole day as everyone seemed to be acting _exactly_ like they had in her dream up until the point when she directly interacted with them, forcing the events to change. Hell, even the weather was just like in her dream.

Faintly the petite mage heard Professor Colbert reminding her to complete the ritual. _In the same tone he had done in her dream!_ On unbending legs she awkwardly traveled forward until she was in front of the huge man. She had to crane her neck almost as far as it could go to meet his curious and confused gaze. At least he wasn't _frowning_.

Not trusting herself to speak to the intimidating figure, she beckoned for him to bend down to her level. Strangely enough the man complied. He even smiled at her. Louise decided that she liked this man a lot more than the one in her dream. Sure, he might not be able to level entire landscapes, but then again, chances still were that he could do that just as well as the other guy. Taking a deep breath to calm herself, with a shaking voice Louise began her chant.

"P-pentagon of the F-five Elemental Powers, g-grant your blessings upon this creature and b-bind it as my familiar." As an afterthought she added a quiet "Please.". She then proceeded to plant a kiss on the giant's mouth.

"Young Lady!" The man exclaimed, scandalized. Apparently he wasn't expecting that.

* * *

><p>Major Alex Louis Armstrong turned out to be a very nice man. Louise was fascinated by his story of origin. The fear she still felt, though not as strong as during their first meeting, surprisingly helped her to keep her scathing comments and selfish demands to herself. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that the fear aided her in viewing her familiar with an open mind.<p>

The days passed, and as she learned more about Major Armstrong, Louise found herself relaxing in his presence. Though he had plenty of quirks that were entirely too strange to be called even remotely normal, Alex was everything and more she could have wished for in a familiar.

When Guiche challenged Alex to a duel because of hurt pride and ego that the young mage had allegedly suffered at the hands of the friendly giant, Louise's heart skipped a bit in fear. Would she lose her familiar, just because Guiche had to go and date two girls at once and Alex unknowingly pointed it out?

Her fears were in vain as it turned out. When the students gathered in the Vestri Court to witness a beatdown of a 'commoner', they were in for one hell of a surprise. When Major Armstrong told her he was an alchemist, she assumed he meant the obscure art some of the wizards, not as gifted with willpower as the rest of them, practiced. Oh, how wrong she was.

Alex simply _demolished_ Guiche and his Valkyres. With one touch of his gauntlet clad fists, the constructs turned into crumpled pieces of metal and actually shot forth to decimate their former brethren. Louise then found out, that Alex was in fact just as well muscled (if not more so) as the guy from her dream. In an impressive feat of flexing, his muscles actually tore the upper half of his clothes apart. Apparently the state alchemist suffered from some sort of strange case of nymphomania. He then proceeded to punch his hands into the ground, which in a fascinating lightshow of lightning-like electricity formed into a statue of himself. The statue was at least three times his own size, towering in the Vestri Court in all of it's Muscled Glory. (Louise felt it deserved the capital letters) It seemed that Louise would have to worry not only about her familiar remaining dressed, but also about him being something of a closet narcist.

* * *

><p>A day later Louise found Guiche, who did not suffer any injuries during the duel, as Alex was too busy erecting the statue, exercising furiously in the fields outside of the academy. He was not exercising his magic, mind you. Instead he opted for some heavy lifting and running. When questioned about his strange behavior, he only answered that Mr. Armstrong had shown him the true way a man should live.<p>

* * *

><p>When Foquet showed up with her giant golem, Louise was not surprised to see her familiar holding his own against it and even pushing it back. What she was surprised about, was the stray giant boulder that broke off from the golem after she tried to cast a fireball at it and in an arc toppled with slow motion (at least in her eyes) sailed at her and crushed her tiny form beneath it. The last thing she heard before she knew no more was the desperate cry of her familiar screaming at her to <em>move<em>.

Louise opened her eyes. She was in her room. The sun had just started shining through her window. There was a bird perched just outside of the window, chirping merrily.

Louise grabbed her pillow and screamed into it, since she was obviously going insane.

**AN: Well, in my opinion someone **_**had **_**to do this sooner or later. Don't expect regular updates, plot or seriousness. What you **_**can**_** expect is randomness, crack and complete OOCness. Thy hath been warned.**


	2. Chapter 2

When Louise left her room, she still had some hope that maybe, just maybe it was all just a bad dream. By the time she got to the dining hall for her breakfast, her hopes were mercilessly crushed by her _predictable_ schoolmates. Still, Louise tried not to despair. After all, she could just summon Alex again and this time around _not_ just stand there and watch the boulder hurtling through the air towards her. In fact, she could just not try to throw fireballs (which resulted in explosions without any trace of fire, mind you) at all and let her Familiar handle the situation. Major Armstrong certainly seemed to have everything under control until she decided to lend a hand.

With this in mind, Louise cheered up and decided to let everything play itself out as it had the first time around (well, technically second time, but she decided not to count the muscle wizard as a successful summoning).

* * *

><p>When the time for the summoning ritual came, Louise braced herself and chanted the same spell she had cast when she summoned Alex, ignoring the teasing of Kirche and concentrating on her magic.<p>

There was an explosion. Louise squinted her eyes and tried to see the familiar figure of the huge man through the smoke. Unfortunately, Alex seemed to take his sweet time appearing. Louise sighed, and went into the smoke to retrieve her familiar.

Only to bump into someone. Who was in the smoke. Who was distinctly female. Who was about as tall as Louise herself was. And who was about as lacking as Louise herself in the chest area.

Pink eyes gazed into fiery red ones. The newcomer was wearing a black cape and pink clothes with some other colors strewn in for contrast. Three gleaming red stones were placed on her wrists and the clasp of her mantle. A mane of red hair, held back by a black headband streamed down her back.

For about a minute the two stared at each other.

Then the strange girl Louise had summoned grabbed her by the collar with her gloved hands and in a way, too intimidating for someone with almost the same bodily proportions as Louise, glared at her.

"Where am I?"

Having been subject of the glare of the muscle wizard, Louise found that while still frightening, this girl did not terrify her nearly as much as Alex did when he appeared. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the redhead was not a two meter tall giant, but rather someone the young Valiere could actually make eye contact with without craning her neck.

"At the Tristain academy of magic." Louise replied.

* * *

><p>Sitting across from each other at a table, Louise stared at her new familiar, and she stared right back.<p>

"So let me get this straight... Lina, was it? You are basically a mercenary sorceress, traveling around and blowing stuff up?"

"What do you mean, blowing stuff up? I'll have you know, the stuff I blow up always deserves it. And besides," Lina waved her hand in a dismissing manner. "From what you told me, you do the same damn thing."

Louise flushed at that.

"Well, maybe so, but I have yet to destroy a city!" She cried in outrage, waving her arms for emphasis.

"I told you, that wasn't me, that was Rezo!" The redhead cried back, equally outraged.

"And what about those numerous villages?" Louise inquired. For some reason, despite knowing that the girl in front of her could easily stomp even her mother into the ground, as far as magic was concerned, the pinkette found the self proclaimed beautiful sorcery genius pretty easy to get along with.

The only thing they did not agree on, was the handling of spells. While Louise was sick and tired of making things explode, Lina Inverse seemed to revel in the sensation. Then again, Louise thought, if she could cast spells as powerful as her familiar, she might get to like it too.

"Heh, accidents." Lina waved the accusation off with what seemed to be practiced ease. "After all, nobody in this world is perfect! We all make mistakes," At this point the redhead stood up and was posing dramatically with fake tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. "And sometimes sacrifices need to be made. For the sake of goodness and justice. And food." She added as an afterthought.

Louise had the strong urge to palm her face. Except her good breeding would not allow it in the presence of another noble. Well, maybe not exactly noble, but someone who would have undoubtedly been a noble, had she been born in this world.

"So anyway. Teach me that summoning spell you used. I will reverse engineer it to send me back home." Lina demanded. That was another trait of hers that grated on Louise's nerves. It did so even more, since the more time the Valliere spent with the Inverse, the more she realized how alike they were. Truly, it was a wonder they were not at each other's throats at the moment, considering both of their short tempers.

"Fine." Louise agreed. She wasn't about to let someone like Lina rampage around in her world. And that was exactly what was going to happen, if her demand was not met. That didn't mean that she would do it for free however. "A spell for a spell. I teach you the summoning ritual, you teach me one of your spells."

Lina looked doubtful.

"I can do that, hell, I can teach you a couple of spells, but what good will it do to you? You said it yourself: any spell you try tends to go boom."

Louise shrugged.

"I managed to summon you." She pointed out.

"Alright. Fine. But I'm not teaching you the Laguna Blade or the Giga Slave. That stuff is hard to control as it is. I'd rather not know what happens when you try to cast it and it goes awry."

* * *

><p>Louise gazed dreamily at the orb of light floating above her palm and lighting up the darkened room. Lina meanwhile stood proudly by the chair Louise currently sat in, beaming at her summoner.<p>

"Heh. Look at me. Not only am I a beautiful sorcery genius, I am also an awesome teacher! Even someone who has spent years studying magic with no success casts her first successful spell after only a few hours of training under me!" The redhead boasted proudly.

Technically it had been two days of studying under Lina until Louise was able to cast Lighting, the majority of which were spent learning an entirely new philosophy of magic use. The young Valliere scion still boggled at the fact, that humans so thoughtlessly borrowed power from demon lords, of all things. Not to mention that demons actually willingly parted with said power. Then again, the Mazoku, as Lina called them, fed on negative emotions and feelings, pain and suffering being just a few examples. If they could cause more death and destruction and by proxy suffering through the hands of humans, simply by giving them a miniscule amount of their true power, then Louise supposed it sort of made sense.

Never the less, today marked the day the Zero was officially no longer a zero. The bright orb in her hand danced around, as if rejoicing at her success with her. Lina promised to teach her a few more spells, though she did not mention which specifically. Louise didn't care. Even if they were simple spells meant to make household chores easier, even if they were completely and entirely useless, she would learn them all.

* * *

><p>This time around Guiche did not dare challenge Louise's familiar to a duel. It might have been because Lina, while training the young Valliere, decided that a demonstration of the Dragon Slave was in order. A sizable part of the wall surrounding the academy was now missing. As well as a part of the forest beyond the wall. And the hill behind the forest. Yes, in hindsight, Guiche was probably not quite as dumb as he looked.<p>

When Foquet attacked, Lina simply blasted the thief away with another one of her Dragon Slaves. Louise was proud, not only because her Familiar had handled the situation so easily, but also because before the golem was obliterated into nothingness, she personally managed to take out a sizable chunk with one of her own fireballs. Take that Kirche.

It was no big surprise when Lina was announced the winner of the familiar competition soon afterwards.

* * *

><p>"How is your work coming along, Lina? Have you gotten any closer yet?" Louise asked from her position atop of her bed, taking her eyes away from the book she was currently reading. Well, it was more like <em>their<em> bed now, since Louise did not dare to suggest Lina sleep on the hay mattress that had been laid out on the day of the summoning rite. It was a blessing that both of them were girls, really.

"Argh!" The redhead retorted, throwing up her hands and messing her hair around. "The way your magic works makes this twice as difficult!" She exclaimed, then heaved a sigh and rested her back against the chair. The desk she had claimed as her own was a mess, pieces of parchment strewn about it in a haphazard manner, all of them covered with Lina's neat, curvy handwriting and strange symbols.

"Not good then." Louise summarized.

"Yeah."

Silence filled the room once more. The pink haired mage felt bad for keeping Lina here. Especially after the redhead told her about this Goury person. Sure, the words 'dumb', 'idiot', 'imbecile' and 'moron' were used way too frequently in the description, but Louise could tell that Lina missed the man.

Her sour thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door.

"Come in." Louise allowed to whomever was on the other side. The door opened and a hooded figure rushed in. Lina had turned halfway around in her chair, resting one of her arms on the back of the chair and gazing questioningly at the newcomer.

Said newcomer, after closing the door behind her, lifted the hood, revealing none other than princess Henrietta.

Louise gasped, jumped from her bed and rushed to greet her childhood friend properly.

After a short hug, the Valliere remembered her manners, however, and lowered herself to one knee, addressing the royalty as protocol demanded.

"Forgive me, your highness. I was overjoyed by your visit and forgot my manners." She uttered, staring at the floor, with her head bowed.

"Huh? What's the deal, Louise?" A familiar voice asked.

The pinkette sucked in a sharp breath. She had forgotten Lina was here!

"Once again, forgive my rudeness, princess. Allow me to introduce you. This is Lina Inverse, though you have seen her earlier today during the showing. She is a _very_ powerful mage and someone whom I am deeply indebted to for teaching me magic that eluded me for so long."

"Ah. It is a pleasure to meet you, miss Inverse. I hope you have been taking good care of Louise and will continue to do so in the future." The princess smiled charmingly. "But dear Louise! Louise Francoise, please, I beg you, there is no need for such formalities. We are friends, are we not?" She asked, her eyes pleading.

Just when Louise was about to defend her actions, as it was fitting to act this way when someone of the royal family was present, she was interrupted.

"Yeah, what's the big deal?" Lina asked, sincere curiosity in her voice.

"What do you mean, 'what's the big deal'? This is the princess of Tristain!" Louise hissed, still unmoving from her kneeling position.

"So?" Seeing the questioning look her pink haired student was sending her way, Lina decided to elaborate. "Remember the girl I told you about? Amelia? She is a princess too."

Louise paled. Yes, she remembered. And she also remembered that this Amelia person was often reduced to a walking wallet or an impromptu punching bag when travelling with Lina.

"Please, do not treat princess Henrietta this way." She begged in a whisper.

"What way?" The redhead asked, as if treating a princess like she did with princess Amelia was a perfectly normal thing.

Louise felt faint while Henrietta tilted her head to one side in confusion.

* * *

><p>The next few days passed by in a blur. The journey to Albion was mostly peaceful, except for the small sparring bout between Wardes and Lina, in which Louise's fiancée had his ass handed to him quite handsomely, and Foquet's short return. Still short though it may have been, it still managed to separate Louise and Lina.<p>

This might have been the reason the pink haired mage found herself in a pool of her own blood inside a church with the prince of Albion dying slowly beside her. She could hear the enraged screams of her familiar, as she dispatched the last remaining forces of the Reconquista.

The last two times around, Louise's death, for that was what it was, was quick. This time, she literally felt the life slipping away from her. Her vision began to darken, as an orange blur appeared before her gaze.

"No! Louise!" The blur screamed. "Resurrection!" The young Valliere felt Lina's magic trying to close her wound, but it wasn't fast enough. Her life was draining too fast.

"Louise!" And then, with a final desperate scream everything went black.

* * *

><p>Louise opened her eyes. She was in her room. The sun had just started shining through her window. There was a bird perched just outside of the window, chirping merrily.<p>

The pinkette sat up and touched her chest, where Wardes' blade had pierced her. Was this just a dream within a dream? Or was she really repeating her life over and over again? Well, this time she had an easy way to find out.

Louise extended her arm and closed her eyes in concentration.

"Lighting." She whispered and slowly reopened her eyes. There, hovering above her palm was the now familiar orb of light.

Louise smiled.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Well, I have to admit, this didn't come out as funny as should be expected of a fanfic with the humor genre. This is mostly because, as I had no choice but to notice, this crossover could have been an awesome story in it's own right. Unfortunately I have neither the time, nor the confidence to start a new story, especially since I'm currently already working on a more serious one that you may or may not get to see in the future. Anywho, hope you enjoyed.<strong>


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